Thader Ryderwood Saves the Galaxy

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         “You better run, Ryderwood!” “We’re gonna get you!”  The voices of the boys stung Thader’s ears as he ran with all his might for the rot iron gate that meant the safety of home.  Unfamiliar houses whizzed by in his periphery.  As he rounded the alley corner his ankle turned and he stumbled.  His hands and knee hit the concrete hard.  Crying out in pain, he turned to see that his pursuers were gaining on him.  He leapt up, hands and knee burning and continued to run, cold air rushing against his knee where his pants had torn.
         In front of him he saw the gate, he was closing in, if he could just make it he would be safe in the two-story Tudor where he could lock the door and keep out the boys who now chased after him like dogs.  He reached the gate and grabbed for the latch.  As he ran through his shirt caught a piece of wire, tearing his sleeve.  Thader barely noticed as he slammed the gate behind him.  He continued onto the familiar porch stairs, bounding up two at a time, and didn’t stop until he had unlocked the door and slammed and locked it again.
         As if his breath finally had a chance to catch up, he gasped, taking in the warm, comforting air.  Shaking, he turned to peer out the peephole and saw the boys pacing outside the gate, shouting threats that Thader could not make out, the biggest one rattled the gate menacingly, but did not dare enter the yard.
         “Thader?” his mother’s voice came from the study.  Thader took a calming breath and prepared himself to sound cheerful. 
         “Yeah, it’s me.”  He set down his backpack and kicked off his shoes, letting each one drop on the hardwood of the entryway floor.  The scrapes on his hands and knee began to sting as he padded through the stripe walled hallway.  Peering into the study, he saw his mother sitting in an oversized chair, beneath a reading lamp with a pile of papers in her lap.  She looked up over rectangular reading glasses.
         “Oh, Thader, honey, what happened?”  She took her glasses off and set them on a small wooden table that was next to her chair.  She took her son’s hand gently and surveyed the dirty, bleeding skin.  Their eyes met and Thader had to use all his will not to let his eyes fill with tears.  His thoughts wandered to what the boys who chased his would say if they saw him crying to his mommy.
         “I fell” he said quietly, pulling his hand back.
         “At least let me get you washed up” his mother said noticing his torn pants and sleeve.
         “I’m fine, I can do it.”  Thader turned, trudged upstairs and went into the bathroom, flipping on the row of round bulbs that lined the top of a large mirror.  He stared at his reflection; round, freckled face, pale green eyes, buck teeth, scruffy brown hair.
         “Biggest loser in the sixth grade” he mumbled to himself crinkling his nose and titling up his chin to further scrutinize his visage.  He looked down at his torn hand and poked a finger into the open skin, gritting his teeth as a little pain shot up his arm.  Sighing, Thader placed his hand under the sink’s running water and washed away the dirt and blood.  Wetting a towel, he dabbed away the grit from his knee, eying the tear in his pants.  “Stupid jerks.”
         In his room Thader crawled into his bed not bothering to change his clothes. The worn, blue blanket was calming as he pulled it over his head, blocking out the world and the boys who took such pleasure in making him miserable.  There was a soft knock at the door.  Thader knew it was his mother, come to see if he was okay, so he chose to ignore it.  A moment later, the knocking came again, this time a little louder.
         “Thader?” She asked tentatively.  Thader didn’t reply.  “Thader, please…”  With both arms Thader flopped down the blanket, revealing his head and shoulders.
         “Come in” he said.  The door cracked slowly and his mother peaked her head through.
         “Can we talk?”  She didn’t wait for Thader to reply, but walked into the room and sat by him on the bed, clasping her hand to his arm and breathing out.  Her face was concerned; she took a moment to think before she spoke.  “I know it’s hard to get used to a new place.  But, it’s not going to be hard forever.  People will warm up to you.”  She paused; Thader could tell she was carefully considering what she was bout to say. “Maybe those boys will warm up to you, too.”  Thader scoffed.
         “They’ll never warm up to me; everyone thinks I’m a loser. Justin and his friends go out of their way to be jerks to me.”  Thader cried, rolling over in a huff.  He saw his reflection in the oval stand up mirror his grandmother had left him.  He thought again about how he hated his freckles and his messy hair and his round face.  He wished he never had to see himself again, he wished his grandmother hadn’t made him promise to keep her mirror before she passed away last year.  Thader closed his eyes.  “I wish Dad was here” he said, almost under his breath, he knew what his mother’s reaction to this statement would be.
         “I do, too, Thader, but he’s not.”  She said.  They sat without talking for awhile, then his mother said “I know that you are destined for great things, what’s challenging now will be a distant memory when you find your place.  You just have to be patient.”
         “You have to say that because you’re my mom.” Thader grumbled.
         “Actually, I get to say that because I’m your mom.”  She stroked his hair, giving him a kiss on the forehead.  “Dinner’s ready if you feel like coming down.”  With that she left the room, closing the door behind her.  Thader rolled over again to stare at the place where his mother had been. 
         He knew he shouldn’t have brought up his father, but sometimes he couldn’t help himself. Thader had never even met his father, all he knew was that he and his mother had moved away from him when Thader was just a baby.  His mother told him that his father was doing important work, and that it was better for her and Thader to live in a place where Thader could go to a good school and she could find work as a chemist.  The latter being the reason for the Ryderwood’s recent move, Thader’s mom had been offered a position as a full professor at the local university.  They had moved nearly three months ago, but to Thader it felt longer.
         The boys at his new school had begun picking on him almost immediately; because of his clothes, because of his hair, because of his scrawny build, because of things that weren’t even true, but Justin said were.  As time went on it had gotten worse, with the boys following him home more and more often, spurred on by Justin, the biggest, nastiest boy in the sixth grade. 
         Thader stayed on his bed and did not go down to dinner.  Instead, he stared up at the constellations he had made out of glow-in-the dark stickers on his ceiling.  He had spent the first weekend in the new house placing each star purposefully.  His mother had asked him how he had made the constellations, because they didn’t look like the real ones.  Thader didn’t know he just knew that they were comforting.  One looked like a large moth, another like a warrior with a slingshot, another like a gondola.
         Thader’s eyes began to feel heavy as he continued to stare at his ceiling.  Just as he was about to drift off he heard a creeeeak, high pitched like an un-oiled door. His eyes opened, he looked around the room.  He didn’t see anything strange; books on bookshelves, clothes in piles on the floor, a desk with papers and comics strewn over it, his grandmother’s stand-up mirror.  He fell back on his pillow and closed his eyes again.  Creeeak. This time it was louder.  Thader felt a little chill crawl over his skin, he opened his eyes again.  This time he thought he saw his grandmother’s stand-up mirror move.  He stared at the oval, wooden frame.  Then, it did!  It moved!  The mirror swung ever so slightly on its hinges.  Thader stared.  Then the mirror swung back until the mirror itself was perpendicular to the frame and parallel to the floor.  Thader gasped his pale green eyes wide.  Slowly, the mirror creaked back into position.  When the mirror was once again parallel to its frame Thader saw something that shocked him into utter stillness.  Staring back at him instead of his own freckled, round faced, messy haired reflection was that of a thick browed, broad chinned, bearded man. 

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         Thader continued to stare.  The man’s mouth was moving, but no sound was coming out.